


The Valyrians reaped the seed they had sown

by 1000lux



Series: A Crown for a Beggar [7]
Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Braavos, Desert, Dragons, F/M, M/M, The great grass sea, Valyria, daario and drogo actually get some bonding too, dany being badass, more sibling bonding, this part is a lot less dark the the last ones have been
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-10
Updated: 2018-01-10
Packaged: 2019-03-03 02:59:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,863
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13332060
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/1000lux/pseuds/1000lux
Summary: Viserys finally wants to make his way to Westeros, but as always things don't go as planned.





	The Valyrians reaped the seed they had sown

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I don't own rights to either the series, the books or the characters.
> 
> So, I literally did not know what to do with the sixth season. I mean, the Dany storyline is great, but I did not know what do with it Viserys-wise, except replicate it 100%, which seemed stupid. So I did pretty much something entirely else, and added here a part I've been wanting to do for some time now.
> 
> Thank you to everyone who's been continuously writing me comments, telling me that they're still interested in this story. <3  
> I apologize for the delay, but I have to wait for inspiration to strike me, and for the last year it's been striking elsewhere.^^°

"If we're going to leave for Westeros, it would be good to leave either Khal Drogo or Daario Naharis behind," Tyrion points out. "Either Dothraki or Second Sons to protect your cities, someone you can trust. And we all agree, it can't be Grey Worm. He's too inexpendable for your army."

"No." Viserys replies.

"No?"

"No. I'm not leaving either of the two behind."

"Making sacrifices is part of being a good leader."

"I told my sister I would be a good leader," Viserys says. "But not quite that good."

"What if the cities rebell against you again?"

"I have full trust in my Unsullied leaders which I leave behind to protect the freedom of the people here. I have trust in the fear I have struck into the hearts of those masters who are lucky enough to still be alive. I have trust in my dragons which will carry me across the Narrow Sea to remind them, if they ever need me to."

****

"We still need a new name for Slaver's Bay."

"I have already decided," Viserys says, smiling. "Slaver's Death."

****

"What do you want in Braavos?!" Dany asks, slightly alarmed. "You can't possibly want to conquer it?"

"I have my reasons."

"Why not sail to Westeros? We are done here."

"Not yet. Not quite."

****

One sandstorm. That's all it takes. When it settles down they're alone in the desert.

"How can a whole fucking army go missing?!"

And it's just the two of them again. Like in the beginning. Viserys and Dany make their way through the desert, trying to reconnect with the rest of their army. And the gods alone know where his dragons are.

Just when you think things can't get worse you're somewhere in the desert without dragons. 

"Remind me, sister, why did I think it was a good idea to send some of our troops over land?"

"Because we don't have enough ships." Dany replies, who is taking this remarkably well. A lot better than Viserys himself anyway.

"Oh, right, because someone set fire to our ships."

"To be fair you set fire to their everything." She's gathered her skirts, marching on through the sand, unperturbed. "Sooner or later someone is bound to find us."

****

An entire Dothraki khalasar circles them, whirling up clouds of sand that waft around Viserys and Dany, obscuring their sight, but it still looks like they are a lot.

"Next time, Dany, please just keep your mouth shut."

"I'm sure they will be reasonable to talk to."

"I wish you hadn't said that."

****

»If you want my dragons and my army to eradicate your khalisar of the face of the earth, that can be very easily arranged.« Viserys says.

The Khal strikes him across the face, having Viserys stumble back and fall to the floor.

»I'll have my men and my horses fuck you!« The Khal tells Viserys.

»I'll take the horses, then.« Viserys replies, wiping blood off his mouth.

The Khal laughs, then he turns and circles around Dany, running a strand of her hair through his fingers.

»I'm going to sire children with your wife.« The Khal tells Viserys.

»That's my sister actually, but you know, a lot of people make that mistake. Also, good luck with that. Her first three were stillbirths and the only living one has only one arm and three eyes.« Viserys replies. »Long history of incest.«

»I'm not some piece of kettle,« Dany then speaks up, stepping into the Khal's path and effectively stopping his prowling. »If you have something to say about me, you say it to me.« She eyes him with all the cold disdain that Viserys would expect of a Targaryen.

****

Dany has been delivered to the Khal's tent for the night. She's been waiting there for quite some time now and she can't say it doesn't bring up old memories.

Then the Khal finally gives her the questionable honor of his presence.

»Trust me on this,« Dany says. »I've had enough Dothraki dick for a lifetime.«

»You don't talk like a princess.« The Khal laughs. »But, I wasn't asking.«

»Neither was I.«

He looks nonplussed for a moment. »Where do you take the guts from, I wonder?« He laughs, something like delight in his eyes. »Some bite, you know. But you bite without even using your teeth.«

****

Viserys has spent the last hour starting to grasp his situation. For now he's sitting on the ground in the tent he's been confined to. His slight outburst after they took Dany away has left him with his arms covered in scrapes, face bruised and his lip split. It's testimony to, of how little danger they consider him that they didn't even bother to tie him up. He didn't think he'd be as bothered as he is, by what's probably happening to Dany now. He's believed himself to be rather detached. He was once upon a time. Would maybe even have considered that she pay her dues after he'd been for years.

The tent flap opens again.

"Oh God!" Viserys jumps up, rushing towards his sister. "Are you okay?! Did he hurt you?!"

"No," Dany seems considerably flabbergasted herself. "We had a drink and then he just send me back."

****

It's interesting to be completely out of power again, when so long everyone heeded his every command. It's interesting. Not comfortable at all, but interesting. Reminds him again that he is just a man. But then again he isn't quite just that either... He's a dragon. And he's far from done.  
It's like he can never win in this fucking desert. Whenever he's here he just happens to be at his lowest. But he's been at his lowest for so many years. He knows how to wield it. He knows what resources to find within himself. This will either end with these men dead or on their knees in front of him.

****

"They will be fine." Drogo says.

"Oh really?" Daario replies angrily. "They're alone out there! Without his dragons! Without us!"

"You haven't known him as long as I have."

They've been searching for them for three days now. But no trace. Not even a sign of the dragons in the sky.

****

"And if you were true to yourself," Dany yells in his face. "You would admit that you are scared!"

He is, no question about that. Bravado can only take your so far. And letting his guard down around his sister for some time now, has the nasty side effect of her actually having a pretty good grasp at reading him. But what does the admission of fear do for anyone? Nothing, that's what it does. Or no, that's not right actually. Admitting your fear does a fairly good job at making your situation worse.

"Yes, I am afraid, sweet sister." Viserys gives her a broad grin. "And so should you be, except of course if you're looking forward to a future as this one's wife."

"We're going to get out of here, Viserys." she says softly.

Seriously? Is that what it has come down to? Her consoling him?!

"Well, I guess, in that case, we have a few chances. Our army shows up miraculously. Our dragons suddenly reappear. The plague takes out all of these people and spares us, equally miraculously. Because I don't know about you, but while fire might not hurt a dragon, there's nowhere that it reads 'pox can't hurt a dragon'. And if all that fails, I guess we're back to you fucking him, all his men and all of their horses." Okay, now he's feeling like shit. Interesting, that feeling usually didn't used to kick in until a few hours later.

Dany only gives him an unimpressed stare. "Well, let's hope it doesn't come to that. And if it does, we can always share. I deal with Khal Moro, you take the rest of them." Now she gives him a sweet smile and Viserys, he actually has to laugh.

"Yes, let's do that, sister."

And while it is nice to know that he hasn't completely fucked up their relationship again, it does really nothing to solve their situation. None of the earlier referred measures are anything Viserys would count on.

Which brings him back to the question, where exactly are his dragons? A sandstorm couldn't kill them, not even harm them. So where are they? Are they unable to find him? Have they abandoned him? The last idea hurts too much to consider. But it startlingly enough proves to him how very, very fragile his assumed power is. He was so used to it. So very used to it. How naive of him to get used to it in the first place, after he'd been shown once before how brittle and fleeting power and happiness are. But, he did. He got used to it once more. Felt secure for the first time in, Gods, twenty years? And now he realises once more that he in himself is nothing, nothing at all. Not without his dragons. Not without his army. It's a dark thought, an ugly thought. But then again, which ruler was ever anything in himself? But he has to think, he has to remember how he aquired all he had in the first place. How he made a Khalasar his own, how he made all of Slaver's Bay his own. Well, he won't be able to do it quite like the first time. 

****

They are taken to Vaes Dothrak.

"Oh yes, amazing," Viserys says. "I wanted to come back here so much. Maybe we can relive our most defining sibling-bonding moments. What do you say, Dany? Maybe we'll even find you another horse heart."

"Is it like your dickishness compulsively increases the closer we get to this place?"

"Well, my dick doesn't."

"Thanks, that's the kind of conversation I want to have with my brother."

"Why are they taking us here anyway? It's not like Drogo's dead."

"All the khals meet to decide where to raid next."

"Oh really? Good to know."

"You would know that too, if you hadn't been perpetually drunk, back then."

"Mostly I was just bored out of my mind."

****

"A khalasar has taken them." Drogo says, fingers still tracing the hoof patterns in the sand.

"What will they do to them?"

"Hopefully nothing."

"What's the worst they could do?"

"Anything." He gets back up. "We have to find them."

"I have a lot of faith in my fighting ability, but even so, if they were really taken by the khalisar, we can't fight them all."

"They will respect me. She's still my wife, they will give them to me. If they are still alive when we find them."

"Shouldn't they be okay if Dany tells them that she's your wife."

"Depends if they believe her. And Viserys, he has a very special way with people..."

"Let's just find them."

****

They are allowed a certain amount of freedom around the city. Things have been going relatively well, for the standards of prisoners. He assumes their relative unharmedness is due to Khal Moro's dubious fascination with his sister.

Just now, he's yet again approaching Dany, circling her like a shark it's prey.

»I'm the greatest Khal in the Wide Grass Sea.« He leans closer to Dany. »You should be honored by my interest.«

»I am the wife of Khal Drogo and you won't touch me until I command you to," Dany tells the khal, her expression perfectly in control. "And maybe, if I think you can satisfy me, maybe then I will sleep with you.«

»We will all fuck you, cunt!« one of the bloodriders says, laughing.

»Shut the fuck up!« Khal Moro tells the man.

****

"You know how Viserys is..."

"Yes, I very well know!" Drogo replies worry veneered by anger. "I've known him far longer than you. And believe me, he's tame now to how he used to be!"

"You believe only you know him?! I was there for him when you chose he wasn't good enough for you!"

"I DID WHAT I THOUGHT WAS THE RIGHT THING!"

They march on in angry silence. The sun scorchingly on their skin. And Daario doesn't like to admit it, despite there being no shame in it, but Drogo is certainly handling the desert better, no matter that Daario's spent his fair share in deserts as well.

"He's tame now, huh?" Daario asks into the silence, just to take his mind of the sand, the sun and the whole futility of their search. "I can hardly imagine that."

Drogo gives a fond snort. "People usually wanted to strangle him right after the greetings, me included."

"And we all know he's such a darling now."

"Let's just say he's making an effort now." He shakes his head. "But Viserys and Dothraki that's never been a good mix."

"Oh really?" Now Daario's laughing.

"You know how I mean it." Even Drogo is smiling now.

****

Viserys looks after the parting Khal, then back at Dany.

"Did he just bring you flowers?"

"Yes. The gods know where he found them in this drought."

****

They find them. And they are still alive. All in all things should be good now. Drogo's name should get them all out of here.

»Khal Drogo?« The other Khal laughs. »That name means nothing here. You sold yourself over to those foreigners, for some pink skin and white hair. You've lost your pride, Drogo. And as I can see, your hair too. I'll take your wife for my wife. And maybe I'll take her brother for my wife too.«

****

Now they're all prisoners of the Dothraki.

Daario smiles at Drogo brightly. "You know, Drogo, I'm beginning to think I should have taken the dwarf instead. Maybe he could have been of actual help."

****

Viserys and Drogo look at each other, taking in their surroundings. They've come a long way from a bowl full of molten gold. Badly shaped insults and desperation. Nights spent in the desert.

"I wonder if it's supposed to tell us something that we'd end up here again?" Viserys asks jokingly.

"A chance to say goodbye," Drogo says after a while. "Who knows if I'll ever come here again, once we've crossed the Narrow Sea."

"You seem pretty sure we're getting away." Viserys taunts. But the truth is, he is too. The mere fact that Drogo and Daario found them out here, is enough to make Viserys believe again. Anything is possible.

"We are." Drogo simply replies.

"How's it feel that you've lost your standing with your people?" Viserys asks then, and he's not trying to be an asshole, contrary habit, he just wants to know. Thinks someone should be asking Drogo that.

"They haven't been my people for some while now. And I think you know that." Not saying that Drogo doesn't feel the humiliation. The helplessness, that he's entirely unaccustomed to. Even though Daario Naharis gave him a taste of it. Drogo reaches up to his shorter hair.

"I wouldn't have come that far without you." Viserys rips him out of his thoughts. "No chance."

"That was the point about offering your sister." Drogo shrugs.

"You could have left me in Qarth. Once the Undying failed. You could have packed up Dany and Rhaego, taken your men and left."

"No, I couldn't have. Not really. Just the same as I couldn't leave after you took on your mercenary."

»I love you,« Viserys says.

»I know.« There's a smirk at the end of the words.

»Ass.«

They kiss.

****

"You don't have to be afraid," Daario says. "We're going to get you out of here."

Viserys smiles. "I'm not afraid."

Daario as always calls bullshit on everything Viserys says. "You're not?" Raised eyebrow and everything. A shrug. "I would be."

"But you're not, because you're such an amazing warrior and if worse comes to worst you can join them and take a wife?" Viserys asks amused.

"Oh, I am worried, maybe just a little." Daario laughs. "Not so much now, though. I was more worried when I thought we wouldn't find you." He thumps Viserys in the chest softly, smile turning tender.

"No need to worry. I've been around a long time before you came along."

"Yes, but admit it, it's more fun now that I am around."

Viserys considers that. "True."

"Do you think anyone will mind if we fuck in here?"

"I think Dany and Drogo might mind when they come back."

"Yeah, I was actually talking about any of the other Dothraki popping in here. Speaking of which, how serious are those no weapons rules here? If I were, let's say, to beat a man to death with a stone, would that be okay?"

Viserys laughs. "I'm probably the wrong person to refer to about these rules. You should ask Drogo. He's quite imaginative when it comes to this."

Daario only looks at him puzzled. "I'm getting the feeling you have history with this place."

Viserys snorts, "This is the place where Drogo poured molten gold over my head."

"He WHAT?!!"

Viserys is perplexed. "You must have surely known that story... I... It was a long time ago. We weren't at good terms back then. That was before... before everything, actually." He's taken aback by Daario's horrified stare. "I– I was fine. As you know. Well, we all didn't know that back then, but– I deserved it, you know. I– I don't really want to talk about that... but maybe you should know. I threatened my pregnant sister, with a sword. So much to the rules about weapons here. Mine was a no-no, Drogo's was pretty much okay." He laughs but stops immediately as he's faced with Daario's stony expression. "It wasn't my proudest moment, or even year." Viserys stops there. "I'm not a good person. I think you've realised that by now."

Daario's expression softens. "What makes you think I give a shit about what kind of person you are? At least now I know what Drogo was talking about on our way here."

"You talked about me?"

"Who else would we talk about?" Daario rolls his eyes. "I think I've done Drogo wrong. I think I underestimated his feelings for you."

"Because he poured molten gold over my head?"

"Because he knew you at your worst and still fell in love with you. I would have too, just for the record."

"You don't know that."

"If I had still been a fighter in the arena instead of the leader of the Second Sons, you wouldn't have given me the time of day either."

"Oh, I would have freed you, like the other slaves. And you would have worshipped me for the rest of your life."

"I already do that, don't I?"

Viserys reaches for a handful of Daario's long braids, bringing their faces close to each other. "Then worship me."

****

»Marry me and I'll let them go.« Khal Moro offers her.

»I won't marry you.« Dany replies. »But you can come with us and join our army. And maybe you can change my mind.«

Not threats or insults or violence. But, »What am I to tell my men?«

»Tell them they'll have a chance to be conquerors beyond their wildest dreams. Tell them of glory. Tell them of riches. Tell them of battle.«

****

»Now, this is awkward.« Viserys says, leading his horse beside Khal Moro's, at the top of the rows of riders.

»If I wanted to make your sister a present, what should it be? Maybe the cut out heart of one of her enemies?«

»I really can't tell if you're being serious right now.«

»You are right. You are right of course. There also needs to be gold, a lot of it. Gold and a cut out heart. That's it. You are a great man, Viserys Targaryen. That you can overlook the bad blood between us and help me out like this.«

****

Then his dragons return and Viserys sees the Dothraki finally believe all he said, has the satisfaction of seeing them all drop to their knees in front of him.

 

Dany and him get onto their dragons and just take off. They have no idea where their army is, but Viserys has a feeling the dragons know. 

When instead of miles of desert sand the ocean shows up below them Viserys begins to question that assumption. 

The dragons don't land and they don't listen to Visery's commands. They've never flown that far. The wind is cold and biting up so high. The air is getting thin. Still the dragons keep flying.

 

"Where are we?" Dany asks, climbing off Tenacity.

They could already see it from the sky, while they were drawing nearer and nearer, the dragons going there like something was pulling them there. Viserys saw it from the sky. The blackened towers. The empty streets. Remnants of a world long gone that even time couldn't eat away. Blackened stone and grey streets. So much ash that centuries couldn't carry it away. Black floods running down the hills and into the streets frozen in time. Cracks and ruptures running through the land. Dead silence except for the wind that soars through the empty carcasses of the once resplendent buildings. A hollowed-out, broken land, devoid of all life.

Ash is still raining down on them, stirred after so long by the landing of their dragons. A fine sheen of it settles on all of them, tinging them in the same grey as the world around them. The dragons are quiet now, calm, looking like statues themselves, petrified relics, only the eyes staring out of the grey reminding of the life that still burns in them. Viserys imagines he and Dany don't look much different. Dany sure doesn't, the white blond hair mottled with grey particles that cover the rest of her body, clinging to skin and cloth alike. Like she's only stone too. A frozen ancestor. One of the thousands that didn't get away. One of the thousand witnesses that still lie in the burned-out buildings under centuries of ash. How many years did it take until the fires finally burned out? Decades maybe. Decades of an already dead world still dying further.

Viserys almost doesn't dare to breath, still can't speak, knows exactly where they are. There is no other place like this. If he wasn't sure already, the huge dragon carcass in front of him would be answer enough. He reaches out a hand and touches the blackened bone. ~Fires so hot even dragons burned~, he remembers the tales he'd been told when he was little.

~The proudest city in all the world was gone in an instant, its fabled empire vanished in a day, the Lands of the Long Summer scorched and drowned and blighted.~

A place of a past long gone by. For a moment Viserys stands as frozen as the world around him, while incessantly the ash keeps raining down. And if they'll keep standing a while longer, soon they'll be covered too, undistinguishable from everything else that's dead around them. It's so silent. So deadly silent. That's the silence that comes with the death of everything. Back at the Red Keep, death had been loud and blinding. Screams and blood. So loud. The clang of iron on iron. Wood breaking, just like bones. So loud. So deafening. Here it must have been the same, when it happenend. Or maybe it was fast. Maybe it was over so quickly, maybe people died so fast, they didn't even know what happened. He imagines the screams of the dragons as they burned to death. No, for them it probably wasn't quick. And now, now that it's over, it's so quiet here. So mute. Everything. No more colors. No blood, no fire. Just the grey in grey, almost white.

Only quietly now, his dragons keen as hollow as the whispers of the walls.

Dany takes his hand, together they step foward into the pristine layer of ash like fresh fallen snow, that's been lying here untouched for centuries, waiting for them to come home. Home. As dead a home as any Viserys's ever had. 

They walk through the vast halls, magnificent once upon a time. Some lost figures burned into the walls. Still frozen like they were in death, looking like grey glass, like dragonglass almost. Like the fires burned too hot and too quickly to eat away on them and instead turned them to stone. Molten half into the wall, become one with the place they once called home. Their fear-filled faces seem to watch Dany and him on their way, like they're going to disattach from the wall any minute now and reach out for them. 

And even inside the building the ash is still unceasingly falling, coming in through the burst windows that had nothing to withstand the heat. Light falls in too, making the particles glisten as they settle to the ground, onto their brothers and sisters who've fallen before them. Clouds of grey and white lift up and surround them on every step. When Viserys turns around and looks behind them there's just their two lonely traces of footprints, deep into the bed of ash. And already new one is starting to settle on it. It's uncomfortable and stiffling. It gets into your eyes and nose. And would into their mouths if either of them was saying anything.

Still Viserys hasn't let go of Dany's hand.

They come to what might have been a throne room once upon a time. There is something like a dais at the end of the hall, a throne on it. Impossible to tell what material it was made of. Now merely it's form is visible anylonger. 

Viserys takes a step toward it, now finally his hand slips out of Dany's. Careful he swipes a hand through the ash, careful like he doesn't know what he could awaken by disturbing this place's peace –it's deep and deadly slumber– unearthing the still perfect marble surface. White and gleaming. Undulled by time. A throne for a kingdom no one cares about anylonger. For a land that is dead. Nothing but an old memory anylonger. Unearthed by a king of a family just as dead and forgotten. 

For a moment Viserys is struck by a feeling of foreboding. Seeing himself look at the Iron Throne in an equally trist surrounding. A dead throne. A burned country. A king of fire and blood. But around him, here, today, the fires have burned out and the blood has run cold. There's nothing left but ash and bone. 

A sad sad coldness runs through his limbs. 

And then he sees them. Lying beside the throne. Just like that. Maybe they'd been always lying there, carelessly strewn on the floor. Whatever may have covered them has long been taken by the flames. The flames that couldn't harm them, when they took out their parents. And still here they are, the lost and abandoned, small and innocent legacy of their fierce ancestors.

Seven eggs. Looking as dead and unpromising as the first three. As dead and unpromising as everything had seemed back then in the desert. They're full of life though, Viserys knows now, full of possibilities. Everything is full of it.

There's a future and there's life. For him. For the Targaryens. For those not yet born dragons that have been waiting for so long. Have been waiting like he's been waiting, waiting so long that he too had felt like he'd been asleep, petrified in his shell, turned to stone before he'd even lived.

Outside the dragons stop their keening. 

When Viserys and Dany return with the eggs, they have settled on the ground looking peaceful. They too are happy not to be the last of their kind. When Viserys looks into Vengeance's eyes it almost looks like she's smiling, showing all her teeth, eyes pressed shut in joy.

Yes, his dragons knew why they took them here. To give him hope. To give them all hope. To help him win the upcoming war. To give them all a future. The Targaryens, the dragons and all the people who've become so ridiculously close to Viserys' heart.

"Time to return," Dany says.

And Viserys feels himself smiling, no, laughing, open mouthed and happy, like his dragons did. And now he tastes the ash on his tongue, but it doesn't bother him anylonger. And his laughter rings through the walls of the city, for the time being drowning out the hiss and keen of the wind. And it's the first happy sound that's been heard inside these walls for centuries. And maybe the hollowed out halls and the dragons and people alike, trapped in here even if only in body, can find peace now.

Tenacity gingerly takes the eggs in her mouth as they prepare to set flight, like a mother who picks up her cub. 

And then they're in the air again and they both watch the towers of the city until they disappear. And as they soar higher the wind washes the ash of them, like a shell breaking off their bodies, like a cleansing and rebirth, by the one true element of dragons besides fire. And Viserys can breath again clearly, and this time the air doesn't feel suffocating. And he's not worried anymore. For his dragons will never abandon him. Just like he'll never abandon them.

****

They've been gone no more than a day. But it might as well have been years.

 

That day they find the rest of their army.

 

Viserys walks up to Drogo and Daario, when the sky is starting to turn orange on the horizon, darkness about to creep up on them across the sand. "I need you now. Both of you." 

He takes them to his tent. And they both follow.

Viserys looks between Drogo and Daario, then he licks his lips and leans back. "Kiss."

They look at Viserys, then at each other. For a moment it looks like they're going to break out in a fight, then they take two careful steps towards each other. Daario is the first to lean in, wry grin directed towards Viserys beforehand.

He's not sure but he thinks he sees something like heat for each other in both their eyes. He watches hungrily as they kiss.

Viserys watches them closely, as they break apart again he says, "Now you touch me."

Maybe it should be a lot more awkward or a lot more tense. And a few weeks earlier Viserys is sure Daario and Drogo would have tried to kill each other. But something in the dynamic between Drogo and Daario has shifted while they where searching for him and Dany together. A grudging acceptance. And, maybe, right now they are just happy to still be alive. There's a certain vibrant intensity between all of them, hands on Viserys' skin, three bodies moving in unexpected unison. A push and pull that is more owed to need than aggression. They are in this together. All of them. And in this moment, nothing matters than moving together.

****

They are already awaited when they make port at Braavos.

"What do you want?" The Bravoosian official asks him. "You're a conqueror. You won't find anything to conquer here."

"I'm a liberator." Viserys smiles at him. "Are you going to deny me entrance?"

"That depends on your business here."

"Oh, I have business indeed. And rest assured, I won't need my army for it. I came here for one thing and one thing only. There's a payment I need to make."

Dany feels the skin on her neck go cold at the look in Viserys' face, pale, taut, the features twisted into an ugly smile, more a grimace, more pain than humor. It's a face she hasn't seen on him in a long time. Whenever she saw it, he would be at his worst and their life used to be at it's worst. She can recount each single time she saw it. Every single time it had looked like he would break and he didn't, instead got gnarled, twisted, numb. Never crumbling, only weathering. Ossifying, persevering, adapting. In a way no one should have to.

The official seems unsettled, but Viserys, Dany and a small group of their men are allowed inside the walls of the city.

****

They leave everyone at the inn. Despite Daario's and Drogo's vehement insistence to the opposite. Just the two of them, like it used to be. Like it seems to be again lately.

They make their way through the city, and despite the years that have passed Dany remembers the places, remembers the twists and turns that Viserys takes, as if it were only yesterday that they'd last walked across the uneven cobblestone. Alleys getting narrower with every turn they take, while the stench becomes stronger. Garbage, unwashed bodies, the canalisation, people who go about their business smelling of booze, sickness or both. A prositute spits on the street, while a young mother tries to hang her laundry out the small window, her toddler in one arm. A dog sniffs on a man who might be drunk and passed-out or might be dead, two boys playing with marbles call him away.  
She wasn't disgusted visiting the slave quarters and the poor districts in Meereen. But right now, all she wants to do is go back to their lodge, to throw away the soiled shoes and the dress that smells like this place and forget it. She hasn't felt such a deep bone shattering fear in a long time. And she doesn't even understand what about.

Finally Viserys' feet slow down. He seems to have found what he came for. The tense set of his shoulders softens and a smile of reliefed joy washes over his face. Dany has long lost sense of where they are going. This part of the city she hasn't set foot in before.

Viserys walks into the shop. With a spring in his step he walks up to the counter. The clerk eyes him with surprise. People who come here aren't usually that well clothed. They are usually only clothed in desperation.

"I've come for my mother's crown." 

"What?" the shop owner says.

Viserys laughs. "Don't worry. I doubt you have it anylonger."

The man seems to catch on, despite outward confusion. And so does Dany.

The door swings open again, a slight chiming sound. Nice and unexpected for these parts of the city. Dany spins around. The lion-woman, Maneater, enters the shop.

"So, you finally caught up with us." Viserys says cheerfully. "I thought you'd gotten lost on the way."

She smiles, all sharp and unsettling teeth in an otherwise beautiful face, that looks like that of a young girl now that she's smiling. "You couldn't run from me if you tried to."

"True." He laughs as well. Then he tells her, "Hold him." Maneater grabs the shop owner and twists his hands behind his back.

"What? No! I–" the man starts babbling, arguing, trying to make his case. "Take whatever you want!"

Viserys ignores him, just smiles at his bargaining, while he rumages in the bag he's brought with him. Yes, bargaining, he's always been good at that, hasn't he? He's gotten old. And fat. Not that he hadn't been fat back then. "I had this specifically made for you, since I was sure you wouldn't have the original one here still." The object he pulls out is a crown. Heavy, golden and beautiful. Expensive too. Very expensive. Not half as beautiful as the one his mother owned though. Well, Viserys did his best.

They sit in silence, waiting for the gold to melt in the pot. They just sit. Viserys' eyes trained on the shop-owner. Never impatient. Not trying to talk. Not moving. Just sitting there in silent contentment and infinite patience. For almost an hour. While Dany feels like crawling up the walls, cursing herself for having come along. With every second they sit it becomes more unbearable. And still she knows it's going to happen. And yes, maybe he deserves it. But this is horrifying. And it becomes even less unbearable knowing that once she was willing to subject her brother to this, did as a matter of fact subject him to it. All because of the day Viserys met this man and days like it.

"No, Viserys–" Dany starts.

Viserys gives her a hard and uncompromising look. "You could watch when it was done to me. You can watch now."

As he slowly pours the gold onto the man's head, not too fast, not too much, as not to kill him too fast, he keeps on asking.

"What are you going to give me for this crown? How many pieces of silver is it worth? Where should I go if I don't want to take your price?! Tell me! Where should I sell myself?!"

Dany is crying when it is over. Viserys who'd only moments ago gleamed with liberation and catharsis, looks at her with discomfort and worry.

"I'm sorry," she sobs. "I'm so incredibly sorry, Viserys!" She throws her arms around him, pressing him close, not letting go, holding him in a vice-like embrace as she cries her heart out.

****

"Why did you take me?" The lion-woman asks. "Why not Grey Worm? Why not your lovers, they would have enjoyed this."

"You're not dumb. You know why not Grey Worm. Concerning Drogo and Daario... This is nothing I want to share with them. This is nothing I want to share with anyone. Dany insisted to come. You, I don't care about you. There is no connection between us."

She smiles. "And still you explain yourself to me."

****

"You went into the city?" Daario asks angrily. "Alone?!"

"I didn't need you to come with me. I've walked these streets when I was a child, and I lived. I could damn-well manage now, as you can see."

"Are you insane?! You could have died! Your sister could have died!"

"Maneater was with us. So fucking relax would you?"

"I am with him on this." Drogo assesses, face terse. "I don't trust that woman, if you even want to call her that, as far as I can throw her. What were you even doing in those streets?"

"Sight-seeing." Viserys replies deadpan.

He's faced with unimpressed and very much judging stares from both sides and it is disconcerting at best, to see those two aligned in the goals for once.

"At this place I was at my lowest. Worse than in the Dothraki desert." That's addressed to Drogo. "Worse than you've ever seen me. Compared to how I was here, I was in a happy state of mind when you first met me. And I have no desire, no desire at all, to let you partake in the history I have with this place. What happened here is only for those who were here when it happened. And you," This time it's directed at Daario. "You'd probably laugh at me and tell me not to be such a pussy, because I'm sure you've experienced worse in your life. Only, of course, you'd never say anything like that to me. But I know it's true, for a fact."

****

Viserys sees his sister and Khal Moro exchange looks across the table as they plan their strategy for the attack on Westeros.

Later he corners her. Well, not corner so much as just ask her plainly.

"Are you sleeping with him?" Viserys lets out a snorting laugh. "Oh gods, you are!"

"So what?" Dany shrugs with a smug smile. "He's certainly nice to look at. And imagine that, he's decent enough in bed too." She flutters her lashes at him.

"Well, damn, am I missing out there?"

"You're not taking another man of mine." Dany laughs.

****

"Where are we going?" Daario asks. 

"The Iron Bank. This wasn't the only old account I came here to settle."

"How much gold do you need?" The bank clerk asks.

"Oh, I didn't come here to get gold. I came here to give you gold. I want to buy issue bonds."

****

"What brings you to our house?"

"I want to hire an assassin." Viserys replies.

"Who is the target to be?" the faceless man asks.

"Many, none. I don't know yet."

"That is not the way we work."

"Does it matter? It is a gift you're bestowing, is it not? Why shouldn't a lot of people be deserving of it?"

"Even if we were to agree. You wouldn't be willing to pay the price. No one can afford to wield the gift of the Many-Faced God in such a way. You should leave, Viserys Targaryen."

Viserys isn't surprised that they know who he is. Would have been disappointed if they hadn't, in fact. Well, they know where to find him, if they change their minds.

****

The girl shows up in Viserys' room in the middle of the night.

"I will do the job for you." she tells him. "At the right price."

"What price would that be?" Viserys asks, sitting up in his bed.

"You will freely pay it. When the time has come."

"Who are you?"

"I am no one."


End file.
